Lybba’s partner, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center (CCHMC), was recently featured in Forbes’ Profiles in Innovation, a weekly series of interviews with pioneering health leaders who are improving both population and individual health. CCHMC, renowned for children’s cancer care, is now working tirelessly to reduce health disparities in the local Cincinnati community. Its Community Health Initiative, led by program director Robert Kahn, is using comprehensive data collection to implement preventive measures against injury and illness.

An early example from this data collection indicated that particular Cincinnati neighborhoods had high rates of childhood asthma whereas other neighborhoods had virtually none. Neighborhoods with more asthma cases tended to have poor housing conditions, and more families without medical insurance and access to medicines. Since such factors are difficult to detect during a 10-minute conversation in the exam room, CCHMC’s Community Health Initiative partnered with the Cincinnati Health Department and Legal Aid to provide home inspections and legal advocacy. Preliminary data collection, therefore, enabled pattern recognition which led to problem solving and a larger, more sustainable impact on the community.

CCHMC’s commitment to health, not just health care, extends to their James M Anderson Center for Health Systems Excellence where a dedicated team of individuals is re-thinking chronic illness care. For the past several years, Lybba has been working side-by-side with CCHMC’s Anderson Center on the Collaborative Chronic Care Network (C3N), which is using software-based data collection tools to enable patients with chronic illness to become more active participants in their health and to spread discovery amongst doctors and hospitals.

C3N has reported significant increases in remission rates for patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), without the use of new medications. A few weeks ago, C3N was awardedPCORI funding to continue their transformative work in IBD. To learn more about C3N and Lybba’s involvement, visitc3nproject.org.

We hope you’ve enjoyed our series on STEM and STEAM education over the past month. Here is a recap of the stories we posted, plus resources where you can find out more about the future of STEM and STEAM:

Lybba participates in the first Biohackathon LA event for students from LA’s Promise Manual Arts High School.

Lybba pays tribute to will.i.am as a musician and proponent of STEM education.

STEAM education: where science meets design

At Lybba, we are particularly interested in the intersection of science and design, which is also the focus of STEAM education. Here are some fascinating projects that bring the two disciplines together:

Recording artist and producer will.i.am has won seven Grammies, but his impact extends beyond music. will.i.am is an outspoken advocate of STEM education, and he has leveraged his popularity to shine a spotlight on science. Here are a few examples of will.i.am.’s dedication to making STEM cooler than it already is:

2011 – will.i.am speaks at FIRST Robotics Competition and tweets that founder Dean Kamen is one of his heroes.

2012 – will.i.am broadcasts his single “Reach for the Stars” from Mars.

2013 – will.i.am announces he is going back to school to study quantum physics.

Over the weekend, Two Bit Circus debuted the STEAM Carnival, an event where every carnival game teaches kids about science. Wondros family member Melissa Painter attended with her son and took the photo above. For more photos of the event, visit Wondros's Pinterest board, and if you'd like to support more STEAM Carnivals, make a donation to Two Bit Circus's Kickstarter campaign, beginning today.